To keep our council property when we can technically buy?

[HungaryForLove]

Hi all,

My partner and I are TTC and thinking about our future. Ideally, after I have a baby I only want to work maximum 2 days weekly so I can be around for our kids, and also save on childcare costs. Partner earns about £35k/year before tax/pension, and we have around £16k in savings. We wouldn’t be claiming UC, just child benefit.

We currently live in a council house that my partner grew up in — he inherited it when his mum moved abroad. It’s a 3-bedroom house. Rent is £480/month. The estate is fine, some people are bit rough around the edges but they never give us any trouble and there’s actually a nice community. I regularly walk to the local shop at night and never feel unsafe. It’s full of young families.

The alternative is buying a 3-bedroom house (we need 3 bed as want 2 DC and I often WFH), which seems to start around £160,000 here and with the 10% deposit of £16,000 our savings would go back down to £0 with no buffer for house maintenance, car issues, maternity leave etc. Also with a 30-year mortgage (we’d need 30 years to be able to afford the monthly payments) at 4.35% interest, I’d realistically need to work 4–5 days a week just to cover costs. I am currently only earning £26,000 full-time. Working so many days would mean barely seeing our kids and only taking home less than £1000 anyway after childcare, and that’s with taking into account the 30 free hours as you still end up paying hundreds a month anyway (I know this from my sister who uses our local nursery 4 days a week for her son who is soon changing to 2 days as she will pay nothing then).

If we stay in the council house, we could comfortably manage on one full-time income and one very part-time income and retain over £10,000 in savings (that would otherwise go on house deposit) to get us through maternity leaves etc, and the a portion of the money we’d otherwise spend on mortgage interest we would invest. Even considering rent going up a few percent per year, we’d still be much more comfortable.

So, AIBU for wanting to stay put in our inherited council house for now, even though we could technically afford to buy? I’m not saying we would stay forever but at least until the expensive childcare years are over, and maybe by then mortgage rates will have become more reasonable and I could go back to working full-time and we’d only be paying wrap-around care.

I do appreciate we are in a fortunate position to be even able to make this choice. Me and DP did grow up in severe poverty, I had alcoholic gambling addict parents and DP is originally from a very deprived country which his DM has moved back to and neither of us will inherit anything. Just to add context.

But the post stating about RTB quoted mine on saying about its not subsided. Hence irrelevant

I’m not sure why it became a debate on RTB when I never mentioned that

we’d only get a £9000 discount from market rate anyway so when the time comes to buy we’d rather see what’s on the market

Don’t be ridiculous. The OP isn’t a charity and isn’t under any kind of moral obligation to procure housing for those deemed more “in need”.

Neither is the tax payer.

Heh I love it when people are so confidently repeatedly ignorant. Have no clues what they're going on about but do it anyway. Especially on SH threads.

warms me cockles it does

I think they just get excited because they can't use the word 'subsidised' much in real life.

This and disability threads
Posters make their own rules up and then get upset by the fact they are wrong .

Tax payer isn't paying her rent

My view is that if you can, it is preferable to buy, rather than to remain renting.

I have no view on the social housing aspect of your post, but believe it would be in your interests in the long term to buy a property for you and your family.

Don’t put home ownership off unnecessarily.

Out of interest just WHY is it better to buy? So you then have to pay for the upkeep? What does owning a house give you that renting one does especially in the case where the OP is in social housing so can decorate etc

Well certainly the govt would prefer us to buy, as we have less chance of needing help with private rent/ there is less need for social housing which they have to provide, and also because it's a handy asset to sell once someone becomes old and incapacitated. I don't know how the state would pay for care otherwise. Call me cynical, but the right to buy has saved the state's bacon - most of the people who bought in the 80s are now elderly. If they'd continued to rent, they would have required housing benefit into old age, and many would have been eligible for funding for very costly care placements.

Yes and what the benefit to the OP then? Or those in her situation?

Op, look to see if your dps house has the right to buy, you can typically find out on your authority website and find the calculator. The discount is limited to £26k now but that’s classed as your deposit and so you could both own the house AND keep your savings.

in my home town our council has built over two hundred new properties in the last few years so my DH didn’t feel bad about buying his flat back when the discount was bigger as the council woman said the money from the sale went into the pot for the building projects. It’s a home for life and future proof for us as it’s a ground for two bed flat with a private garden and shower room.

If the OP or her partner get ill, can’t work, they won’t lose their secure tenancy, the rent if they are on a low income will be all, or partially covered by housing benefit. If they buy a house and the same thing happens, who helps pay the mortgage? No benefits available with that. The worst case scenario could see them homeless, and in a lot worse position given the acknowledged shortage of social housing. Stay put at least until your DC are older OP.

I just assume they're on a wind up when they say that. Nobody is that dim, they can't be.

Makes me laugh though

Or double down and hope for the best.

its like they really wish what they're saying is true and if they say it often enough it will be!

For me, I would rather buy.

Housing is usually an individual’s largest outgoing each month, and I’d prefer to retain some of that money in an asset that I own. An asset which typically grows in value.

I can remain there and leave it to my children to inherit, I can sell after a while and climb the property ladder, I can rent it out and buy an additional property. It gives me much more choice than renting ever would.

Not true - there are insurance policies which cover this kind of situation.

No one should buy a property without having this type of insurance in place.

I believe home ownership is more beneficial to the individual in the long term, rather than renting. And it’s better to get on the housing ladder sooner rather than later. Anything can happen to anyone in life - no one should allow “what it’s” to prevent them progressing in life.

See I own my place. But while I'm alive I dont really get any benefit of owning it rather than renting . The only way it's a usable " asset" is if I sell it then of course I have no where to live

Many people rent simply because they may need to move around with work. Imagine the hassle of selling and buying houses every couple of years when you get a different work contract

@Thechaseison71 Presumably you will be mortgage free at some point?

Many people rent simply because they may need to move around with work. Imagine the hassle of selling and buying houses every couple of years when you get a different work contract

Rather than selling their property though, they could rent their property out to ensure their mortgage is being paid off, whilst they move around with different work contracts.

They would still have to rent, however, my scenario allows them to retain an asset at no additional cost.

Home ownership offers more options than simply renting.

In my opinion, being able to "inherit" council housing is the second worst thing after selling them off.

You'll soon be able to do this in the private sector. Wales put this in a few years ago

Then have to deal with being a landlord. Many simply don't want the extra layer of hassle.

Strangely it seems the UK is far more obsessed with home ownership than other countries

Oh and I am mortgage free. But if id done the whole " climb the ladder" I wouldn't have been. I stated in a small flat rather than it bigger and bigger houses like many of my age group

But the situation 30 years ago when I bought my place ( I was young) and the OP having a 3 bed house are miles apart

Again though once I retired if I didn't have enough money to pay rent if I had a council property then id get housing benefit or whatever they call it these days

Only you can decide on whats best for you your rent is massively cheap

Then have to deal with being a landlord. Many simply don't want the extra layer of hassle.

Perhaps not. But many people do benefit nicely from the additional income of being a landlord, despite the “extra layer of hassle”.

I can’t even fathom using my own money to pay off someone else’s mortgage, when I could be paying off my own.

I appreciate that the OP is in social housing, but I still see renting as such a waste of one’s own money. I do understand that many people don’t have the option but to rent, but the OP does have the option. I’ve never thought about it as a choice before. It’s certainly not a choice I would make. Come to think of it, I don’t think I actually know anyone who rents.

I will be advising my own children to buy a property as soon as possible, and if they do require to rent, to not stay in that position for too long.

Home ownership offers you choices that renting does not. And I’d rather have choices in life.